


Memories

by cadkitten



Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Brotherly Love, Canon Temporary Character Death, post-death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-11
Updated: 2016-08-11
Packaged: 2018-08-08 00:40:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,261
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7736365
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cadkitten/pseuds/cadkitten
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dick's clothing spilled over a chair in the corner of the room, though Damian couldn't decide if that was the dirty or the clean stack and he didn't much desire the idea of picking any of it up for a cursory sniff. "Someone forgot to teach you how to do shit for yourself, didn't they?" The words came, muttered under his breath as he made his way over to the dresser beside the heap of clothing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Memories

**Author's Note:**

> For DynamicDuoWeek2016 over on tumblr. Day 3: Shirt Thief  
> Beta Readers: kate1zena  
> Song[s]: "If I Break" by Red

Damian dropped his mask on the bed, sighing as he began peeling off layer after layer of his costume. He and Dick had been out all night, tracking a big haul of drugs across Gotham and well into Blüdhaven. The take down hadn't been easy and by the time they'd wrapped up the twenty plus men and put in the call to the police, it had almost been dawn. With the past few nights having been longer than they were used to and Bruce dragging Damian out to social events during the day, Damian had felt it far past time for him to find another place to stay for the day. 

So, here he was, in Dick's bedroom, changing while Dick took a much-deserved shower given that he'd taken a nasty spill off the docks and had brought the unpleasant smell of fish home with him. Damian pitched his undershirt onto the bed and turned away, glancing around the room. Dick's clothing spilled over a chair in the corner of the room; Damian couldn't decide if that was the dirty or the clean stack and he didn't much desire the idea of picking any of it up for a cursory sniff. "Someone forgot to teach you how to do shit for yourself, didn't they?" he muttered under his breath as he made his way over to the dresser beside the heap of clothing. 

Tugging open the top drawer, he found a myriad of items with their tags still on them. A glance at the tags told him why, most of them in sizes that were somehow absurd for Dick's size - either too big or comically small. He fished out a pair of sweatpants far too small for Dick, holding them up to himself and deciding they'd do just fine for him. Folding them over his arm, he rooted around for a shirt, finding they were all on the too large end, even for Dick, much less for him. 

The next drawer down held all of Dick's undergarments and Damian closed it quickly, moving on to the last drawer, which was entirely empty. Rolling his eyes, he pushed himself up and did a quick glance of the room. Seeing the arm of a t-shirt sticking out of the dresser beside Dick's bed, he padded over and tugged it open, staring down at the shirt for a minute before picking it up. He settled on the edge of the bed, slowly unfolding the soft, faded red fabric. 

There was no lying about it. The shirt was as surely his as it was existing in Dick's room and he knew exactly where he'd last left it, lying on his bed in the manor, ready to be put on when he came home the very night he'd died. He let his fingers trace over the peeling gold of the W, remembering it had been the first item of clothing his father had given him when he'd come to live with him. He'd never let on that he'd cherished it or that he'd been heartbroken when he couldn't find it upon his return, but now that he was looking at it, all of that came back to the surface. 

On the outside, it was _just_ a piece of clothing: a lousy shirt that could have been replaced with one of a hundred like it, but further down, it had meant the world to him. Which brought the question of why it was here. It wasn't a hard deduction, though it was one that left him feeling numb inside; as if something had burrowed deep within him and was hard at work hollowing him out. His fingertips tingled and his mouth started to feel like cotton, the whole ordeal leaving him with an aching sadness stuck up between his ribs and he didn't even think about what he was doing as he carefully folded it back up. Standing up, he reached to place it back in the drawer, settling it down just as the bedroom door was pushed the rest of the way open, Dick stepping inside.

Damian's head snapped up and Dick froze, his gaze not on Damian, but on what he was doing. Damian kept his eyes on Dick, watching the split second in which Dick began to crumble before the lid was slammed shut on all of his emotions, leaving behind the flat emotionless face he'd seen Bruce wear so many times. 

Damian expected a lie, a floundered-up reason for why Dick had his shirt tucked away in a drawer that seemingly contained a variety of other pieces of his past. More so why part of it had been sticking out of the drawer when the rest of the things in there were so obviously tucked away with absolute care, but he didn't say a word, just walked to the pile of clothing, plucking off a pair of comfortable-looking gray pants, pausing for only long enough to pull them on under his towel and then let the towel fall to the floor beside the chair. 

Pushing the drawer closed, Damian seated himself back on the edge of the bed, watching Dick continue through his routine, watching the cracks between the solid granite of the rest of his actions: the tremor of his hand before he caught it, the grit of his teeth before he put his tongue between his teeth to stop it. When he could stand no more, couldn't watch another second of Dick trying not to fall apart, Damian finally spoke up. "It was all you had left... wasn't it?"

The pain that lanced across Dick's face was palpable, leaving Damian's heart wrenching in his chest. Picking back up the pair of pants he'd decided to make his own, he stood up and made his way toward the door. "I want you to keep it." He hesitated at the door, his back to Dick, giving him his privacy to break if he needed it. "It meant a lot to me, maybe more than a lot of other things, but you should know something." 

"Yeah?" Dick's voice hedged with barely held back emotion, the essence of a man drowning in himself displayed on the syllable. 

"You've always meant more." It wasn't the best of words as far as expressing how much he cared about him, but it was more than enough to create the exhale of breath he heard from Dick, to tell him he should continue on his way out unless he wanted to hear his mentor, his brother, his _partner_ crumble. In a way, it was hard to believe he'd made such an impact on Dick's life in so little time. On the other hand, he knew just how much being Robin to Dick's Batman had meant for him, just how much he'd needed someone in his life to provide him with that direction. In that way... he understood. "You always will."

Stepping out, he closed the door behind him, waited until he heard the drawer open and the springs of the bed, all of it more than enough to paint the painful picture of Dick holding onto that shirt, telling him why it was the only thing disturbed in the drawer of untouched memories. Because every single day, Dick Grayson thanked everything in the world that he had him back... and every single day, he relived the pain of his loss.

Damian lifted his chin and moved away from the door, determination burning bright in his eyes. _Somehow, someway, he was going to drive away every ounce of that pain._


End file.
